Kim Shoemaker

Retired IT & security Fed. I worked for my step-father's small business, I had a rock band & an improv group.

[unusual_whales @unusual_whales]

The average cost of a date night in the US has climbed to $189, representing a 12.5% increase from $168 in 2025, per WSJ

[Brian Roemmele @BrianRoemmele]

What are the real costs and risks of replacing legacy COBOL systems with modern alternatives?

After spending a decade and $100 million to replace a legacy COBOL system, enterprises often find their modern cloud architecture slower than a 40-year-old mainframe.

COBOL systems on IBM mainframes process trillions of dollars in daily transactions for banks, insurers and governments extremely well. Over 40–60 years they have accumulated layers of patches, updates and custom logic.

The high financial and time costs of rip-and-replace migrations are a major barrier; enterprise overhauls often take 5–10 years, by which time the target architecture may already be obsolete.

The greatest risk is loss of undocumented business logic—the COBOL code is frequently the only documentation. Reverse-engineering decades of obscure patches can miss edge cases, such as a 1993 tax exemption, causing critical transaction failures.

Mainframe-to-cloud moves are rarely 1:1. Mainframes excel at high-volume batch processing and heavy I/O; distributed microservices introduce network latency that bottlenecks performance and raises costs.

There are AI approaches but none have been very successful thus far.

In fact I am working on a COBOL update for a client right now.

Consequently many enterprises abandon full replacement for in-place modernization—wrapping COBOL in APIs for modern apps or translating it to Java—while gradually updating the edges.

[UberFacts @UberFacts]

Most people stop listening to new music at age 33

A 2015 Spotify study found that overall listening time doesn’t drop as we age — we simply replace current music trends with replaying what we already know

[Kim Shoemaker @Red_Shoemaker]

@WallStreetApes Maybe Congressman should wear cameras wherever they go?

[Kim Shoemaker @Red_Shoemaker]

Recently, the professor of rock was given an official playlist of classic rock bands and songs to be played. So, it’s official why you hear the same songs over and over. My impression is he could sometimes play other artists. Did the Beatles hurt themselves by not continuing?

[Bob Seger @BobSeger]

The “Wait For Me” official music video is out now on YouTube in HD! Check it out here https://t.co/eulvzkgk2I

[Insider Paper @TheInsiderPaper]

NEW: A Canadian woman of Chinese origin, working as an intern at NATO strategic HQ, has been arrested by Belgian police on suspicion of “spying on behalf of a third country and of being a member of a criminal organization.” — Politico EU

[Brilliant Maps @BrilliantMaps]

Presidential election voter shift from 2000 to 2020

Anything surprise you?

Source: https://t.co/rWIRU4hfOQ

[Elon Musk @elonmusk]

Yikes

[Kim Shoemaker @Red_Shoemaker]

I live in what would typically be considered a middle class house in1971, but it’s probably the least impressive of any of my former coworker’s homes, lol. The points are that most people expect way more earlier in life and a lot of things are priced around two income families.

[Patrick Webb @Patrickwebb]

BREAKING: New study finds that a minimum-wage worker in 1971 had a lifestyle affordability similar to someone making $100K today.

[Nikita Bier @nikitabier]

We found 42,000 accounts automating replies using chatbots and have removed them from the platform.

X's core value is providing an authentic pulse on humanity -- and using AI to programmatically engage with users without a human in the loop runs counter to our mission.

[The General @GeneralMCNews]

BREAKING: 53 cities have removed Flock cameras, only to replace them with Axon-mounted cameras.

[unusual_whales @unusual_whales]

Homeownership has become far more expensive since 2019, with emergency repairs up 175%, maintenance up 85%, insurance up 72%, interest up 35%, property taxes up 31%, and principal payments up 22%, per WSJ:

[ESPN @espn]

Breaking: LeBron James is signing with the Philadelphia 76ers on a two-year, $8 million deal with a player option, his agent Rich Paul told @ShamsCharania.

[Leading Report @LeadingReport]

Foreclosures hit their highest level since 2019 in the first half of 2026, according to Yahoo Finance.

[paris martineau @parismartineau]

New: State health officials say parsley and cilantro appear to be linked to surging cyclospora cases in North Carolina

The disclosure comes as the FDA says it’s investigating a new outbreak linked to an unidentified source. Unclear if the two are related
https://t.co/3riZ2JACav

[Kim Shoemaker @Red_Shoemaker]

@lady_valor_07 I was in a hotel room where pretty much the only channel I could get was MTV which kept playing the jump 21; jump 22 movies. So, I think I’ve been there and done that.

[Kim Shoemaker @Red_Shoemaker]

Long before widespread AI or sophisticated algorithms, a credit card company started mailing my statements to Cincinnati. They would never explain to me why they thought I had moved, literally, to Riverfront Stadium. Batter up!

[Insider Wire @InsiderWire]

#BREAKING: 2 stabbed in Manhattan’s Upper West Side; suspect yelled “Allahu Akbar.”

[Polymarket @Polymarket]

JUST IN: U.S. imposes new 10% to 12.5% forced-labor tariffs on imports from 60 economies.